Russian Soyuz TMA-14M Capsule Reaches Space Station - Solar Array Deployment Issue

A Soyuz TMA-14M spacecraft, with only one of its two solar arrays deployed, is seen nearing the International Space Station on Sept. 25, 2014 (Eastern Time) to deliver three new members of the Expedition 41 crew. 

The stuck solar array did not hinder the Soyuz capsule's single-day trip to the space station.

Credit: NASA TV

A Russian-built Soyuz capsule carrying a crew of three reached the International Space Station late Thursday (Sept. 25), despite a stuck solar array that failed to deploy just after its launch six hours earlier.

The Soyuz TMA-14M spacecraft linked up with the station at 10:11 p.m. EDT (0211 GMT) as the two spacecraft sailed high over the Pacific Ocean.

The Soyuz arrived at the space station with American astronaut and two Russian cosmonauts, including Elena Serova, the first female cosmonaut ever to visit the International Space Station.

Russia's Soyuz vehicles are three-person spacecraft made up of a crew capsule, orbital module and service module powered by two winglike solar arrays.

Initially, Russian engineers were concerned the stuck solar array would block a radiator and lead to hotter temperatures inside the Soyuz, but the capsule's crew reported all was well, NASA officials said.



The Soyuz clearly had enough power for a smooth docking, despite being at half-capacity.

"The port solar array isn't deployed but the power situation is fine. It just doesn't look good from the point of view of photographs," one of the Soyuz crew said during the docking.

"We're eating and drinking, and we're in good spirits. Everything is as it should be."

The docking occurred just hours after a flawless launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, where Serova and her crewmates, NASA astronaut Barry "Butch" Wilmore and cosmonaut Alexander Samokutyaev, bid farewell to Earth to begin a nearly six-month space mission.

Trio joined three other space travelers already aboard the station: astronaut Reid Wiseman of NASA; Alexander Gerst of the European Space Agency; and Russian cosmonaut Maxim Suarev, who commands the station's Expedition 41 crew.

That little red streak hidden behind the SpaceX Dragon solar array is the Soyuz launching.

NASA ORION Space capsule: Recovery test in ocean suspended after issue

This Wednesday, Feb. 19, 2014 photo released by NASA shows crews testing a test version of Orion's forward bay cover, NASA's next-generation space capsule. 

NASA and the Navy suspended the test Thursday, Feb. 20, 2014 off the coast of San Diego after a problem was discovered. 

AP Photo/NASA

A training exercise designed to showcase the government's ability to recover a space capsule at sea was scrubbed after NASA ran into trouble off the Southern California coast, the space agency said Friday.

Crews had difficulty tying down a mock-up of the Orion capsule aboard an amphibious warship off the shores of San Diego.

NASA said cables attached to the capsule weren't strong enough to handle turbulence and snapped off twice while it was in the well deck of the USS San Diego before it could be moved out to sea on Thursday.

With the Orion mock-up still on the Navy ship, teams could not practice fetching the spacecraft from the ocean.

"Even though the testing didn't go as we had planned, we're learning lessons that will help us be better prepared to retrieve Orion," Bill Hill of NASA headquarters said in a statement.

Engineers were troubleshooting the problem, and it was not clear when the test would be rescheduled.

NASA has been developing a next-generation spacecraft to carry astronauts beyond low-Earth orbit, possibly to an asteroid or Mars.

Orion, which will make its first unmanned test flight this fall, is being designed to travel to deep space and return at speeds of 25,000 mph (40,232 kph) by splashing down into the Pacific.

This Wednesday Feb. 19, 2014 photo released by NASA shows a test version of the Orion spacecraft, tethered inside the well deck of the USS San Diego prior to testing between NASA and the U.S. Navy. 

NASA and the Navy suspended the test Thursday, Feb. 20, 2014 off the coast of San Diego after a problem was discovered. AP Photo/NASA

The water landing is a throwback to the 1960s and 1970s when Navy ships routinely tracked and recovered Mercury, Gemini and Apollo spacecraft after re-entering Earth's atmosphere.

With the space shuttle fleet retired, NASA has decided to go with an ocean splashdown.

Unlike in the past, when helicopters would hoist astronauts after a mission, the new plan calls for an amphibious transport ship to dispatch divers and small boat teams to recover Orion and its crew.

Last year, NASA and the Navy practiced recovering the Orion in the calm waters of the Elizabeth River in Virginia with no problem.

Before the latest test was called off, NASA said crews successfully retrieved parts of the spacecraft, including the parachute and a protective covering.

NASA Administrator Charles Bolden was supposed to visit the test site Saturday, but his appearance was cancelled.

NASA Space suit issue prompts delay of second spacewalk

In this image made from video provided by NASA, astronaut Rick Mastracchio performs a space walk outside the International Space Station on Saturday, Dec. 21, 2013. 

Mastracchio and Michael Hopkins ventured out of the station to try to revive a crippled cooling line. 

AP Photo/NASA

Astronauts removed an old space station pump Saturday, sailing through the first of a series of urgent repair spacewalks to revive a crippled cooling line.

The two Americans on the crew, Rick Mastracchio and Michael Hopkins, successfully pulled out the ammonia pump with a bad valve—well ahead of schedule.

That task had been planned for the next spacewalk, originally scheduled for Monday but now delayed until Tuesday, Christmas Eve, because of the need for a suit swap.

"An early Christmas," observed Mission Control as Mastracchio tugged the refrigerator-size pump away from its nesting spot.

If Mastracchio and Hopkins keep up the quick work, two spacewalks may be enough to complete the installation of a spare pump and a third spacewalk will not be needed as originally anticipated.

Several hours after Saturday's spacewalk ended, Mission Control bumped spacewalk 2 to Tuesday to give Mastracchio enough time to prepare a spare suit.

His original suit was compromised when he inadvertently turned on a water switch in the air lock at the end of Saturday's excursion.

NASA officials said Saturday night that it's unclear whether a third spacewalk will be needed and when it might occur, if required.

A third spacewalk had been slated for Christmas Day before the latest turn of events. NASA requires a day off between spacewalks for astronaut rest.

The space station breakdown 10 days earlier left one of two identical cooling loops too cold and forced the astronauts to turn off all nonessential equipment inside the orbiting lab, bringing scientific research to a near-halt and leaving the station in a vulnerable state.

Mission Control wanted to keep the spacewalkers out even longer Saturday to get even further ahead, but a cold and uncomfortable Mastracchio requested to go back.

The spacewalk ended after 5½ hours, an hour short on time but satisfyingly long on content.

Earlier, Mastracchio managed to unhook all the ammonia fluid and electrical lines on the pump with relative ease, occasionally releasing a flurry of frozen ammonia flakes that brushed against his suit.

A small O-ring floated away, but he managed to retrieve it.

"I got it, I got it, I got it. Barely," Mastracchio said as he stretched out his hand.

"Don't let that go, that's a stocking stuffer," Mission Control replied.

"Don't tell my wife," Mastracchio said, chuckling, as he put it in a small pouch for trash.

Mastracchio, a seven-time spacewalker, and Hopkins, making his first, wore extra safety gear as they worked outside.

NASA wanted to prevent a recurrence of the helmet flooding that nearly drowned Luca Parmitano, an ESA Italian astronaut last summer, so Saturday's spacewalkers had snorkels in their suits and water-absorbent pads in their helmets.

To everyone's relief, the spacewalkers remained dry while outside. But midway through the excursion, Mastracchio's toes were so cold that he had to crank up the heat in his boots.

Mission Control worried aloud whether it was wise to extend the spacewalk to get ahead, given Mastracchio's discomfort.

Not quite two hours later, Mastracchio had enough as he clutched the old pump.

When Mission Control suggested even more get-ahead chores, he replied, "I'd like to stow this old module and kind of clean up and call it a day."

He said a couple of things were bothering him, not just temperature, and declined to elaborate when asked by Mission Control what was wrong.

Flight controllers obliged him. Once the old pump was secured to a temporary location, the spacewalkers started gathering up their tools to go in.

Adding to the excitement 260 miles (418 kilometers) up, a smoke alarm went off in the space station as the astronauts toiled outside. It was quickly found to be a false alarm.

The pump replacement is a huge undertaking attempted only once before, back in 2010 on this very unit.

The two astronauts who tackled the job three years ago were in Mission Control, offering guidance.

Mastracchio promised to bring back a wire tie installed on the pump by the previous spacewalkers. "Oh, awesome, thanks Rick," replied the astronaut in Mission Control who put it on.

The 780-pound (354-kilogram) pump is about the size of a double-door refrigerator and extremely cumbersome to handle, with plumbing full of toxic ammonia.

Any traces of ammonia on the spacesuits were dissipated before the astronauts went back inside, to avoid further contamination.

NASA's plan initially called for the pump to be disconnected in the first spacewalk, pulled out on the second spacewalk and a fresh spare put in, and then all the hookups of the new pump completed in the third outing.

French Bond Issue to Fund Next Gen Rocket

The French space agency, CNES, expects to award contracts valued at more than $900 million in September as part of a multibillion-dollar French government bond issue that has earmarked funds for work on a next-generation rocket, two Earth observation satellites and satellite-delivered broadband, a senior CNES official said June 4.

Marc Pircher, director of CNES’s Toulouse Space Center, said a total of 750 million euros ($915 million) will be divided evenly among the three project categories. A formal request for bids will be issued in July, Pircher said during a press briefing on the eve of the Toulouse Space Show, which begins June 7.

One-third of the funds will be spent on demonstrators and early design work on a next-generation launch vehicle to succeed today’s heavy-lift Ariane 5 rocket. France is focusing on a modular rocket whose different versions would carry government satellites into low Earth orbit and commercial telecommunications satellites weighing up to 6,000 kilograms into geostationary-transfer orbit, one at a time.

According to current thinking, the vehicle could succeed both the Ariane 5 and the European version of Russia’s Soyuz vehicle. Designed to appeal first and foremost to European government customers, the vehicle program’s financial health would be much less dependent on the commercial launch market than today’s Ariane 5.

A second category of funds will be for two environmental satellites. A methane-measuring spacecraft, formerly called Charme and now known as Merlin, will be built jointly with Germany. France will be financing half the mission’s estimated 160 million euros in total costs.

The second environmental satellite, named SWOT, or Surface Water Ocean Topography, is a joint French-U.S. mission to follow on from the Topex-Poseidon and Jason series of ocean-altimetry satellites.

Pircher said CNES is ready to invest some 170 million euros in SWOT, which he said is equivalent to around 30 percent of the total mission cost. NASA has not yet confirmed SWOT as a mission. But Pircher said ocean altimetry remains a high priority for France and the early SWOT investment is intended both to maintain French expertise and to signal France’s commitment to NASA.

The final area of space-related investment for the French bond proceeds is to extend broadband access to regions in France that lack high-speed terrestrial links.

Pircher said some funds are likely to be spent on demonstration projects using the large all-Ka-band Ka-Sat satellite to be launched by fleet operator Eutelsat of Paris late this year.

Longer term, the broadband financing will be directed to technologies for future superfast broadband connections via satellite, and a small next-generation broadband satellite to be called Megasat.

Pircher said it has not been decided how much of this 250 million-euro envelope will be spent on near-term broadband penetration with Ka-Sat, and how much will be reserved to develop future, higher-speed broadband technologies.